Zhao hid most of his spiritual power and slowly approached the giant crab.

  A bright red giant crab is using its two over-one-meter-long huge pincers to pick up pieces of fire-red coral reef rocks the size of a foot and send them into its mouth, "crunching" and grinding them finely, savoring them with relish.

  It suddenly stopped moving, and the two eyeballs on its head, slightly larger than a human skull, rolled upwards to glance at the human cultivator slowly flying towards it from above, revealing an anthropomorphic expression of disdain.

  The crab suddenly leaped up, instantly soaring dozens of feet high, spewing red flames and swinging its two huge pincers to fiercely smash towards Zhao Di.

  Zhao Di's body remained still, but he quickly retreated backwards, easily avoiding the giant crab's pincers. Then, with a lift of his left hand, a cyan-colored jade ruler several inches long floated above the giant crab, transforming into a size of over ten feet in the blink of an eye, its color becoming increasingly dense and turning a deep green that seemed to drip with moisture.

  The giant crab was stunned, only to sense that the human cultivator's cultivation was almost on par with its own. At the same time, it discovered the massive spiritual pressure emanating from the jade ruler above its head. It swiftly swung its pincers towards the jade ruler.

  This giant pincer is the hardest part of the body of the Supreme Yang Crab. Let alone an extreme treasure, even an ordinary magic weapon would find it difficult to escape once clamped by this giant pincer, and may even be damaged.

  The jade ruler seemed unavoidable and was suddenly clamped by this pair of giant pliers!

  The giant crab let out a joyful low roar, its pincers exerting great force, intending to destroy the jade ruler once and for all. However, its strength was completely wasted, as the jade ruler was easily pinched by the giant pincer and transformed into tiny green lights that vanished into thin air.

  The giant crab was stunned again, its eyes scanning around, only to see a few drops of emerald green liquid dripping from a jade ruler that was an extreme shade of cyan. These liquids quickly transformed into another identical jade ruler, which also began producing more emerald liquid and jade rulers.

  In the blink of an eye, the giant crab was surrounded by dozens of jade rulers that were so green they seemed to be dripping with dew.

  Because of its low spiritual intelligence, the giant crab couldn't distinguish between real and fake jade rulers. It waved its pincers ceaselessly, clamping down on each jade ruler. Every jade ruler that was caught by its pincers transformed into tiny green lights that vanished in mid-air.

  After a futile and fierce pounce, the giant crab seemed to be intimidated, spitting out a large amount of fiery red mist, wrapping itself in it. Because at this moment, it found that dozens of jade rulers were no longer changing and were striking towards it in unison. The surroundings were filled with cyan ruler shadows, and the giant crab had nowhere to hide, and could only rely on the fire mist to protect itself.

  Dozens of green rulers did not fall with a single blow, but instead surrounded the giant crab, trembling continuously at a distance of more than ten feet around it.

  On top of the giant crab's head, a golden giant bell of about one zhang in size appeared at some unknown time.

  Zhao Di's palm print landed on the Golden Bell, and it immediately let out a loud "Dong" sound.

  The flames that had engulfed the giant crab seemed to be blown away by an invisible force, disappearing in an instant. The crab itself stumbled and fell at the sound of the bell, plummeting downwards.

  Dozens of green rulers also targeted this opportunity and struck neatly at the giant crab.

  The giant crab finally came to its senses in mid-air, and with great difficulty stabilized its body. Then, it saw countless dark shadows rushing towards it, and could only dance wildly with its claws to protect its vital parts.

  However, every cyan ruler that came into contact with its pincers ultimately turned into a faint cyan glow, and every cyan ruler that hit its body was incredibly powerful! This wave of cyan rulers' attack had not yet ended, the giant crab let out a miserable cry, fell to the ground, and died on the coral reef.

  Zhao Di revealed a satisfied expression, and transformed the jade ruler and golden bell into miniature size again, storing them in his storage bag. Then he landed on the coral reef, taking out the You Yang Crab's demon core and demon soul. As for that pile of extremely hard giant pincers, he didn't let them go either.

  After doing all this, he turned the corpse of Zhīyáng Crab into ashes and then flew to the cave mansion where Xīmén Sǎnrén was.

  "Master, these two magical artifacts are quite powerful. With them, you should be more than able to protect yourself during the Foundation Establishment stage!" Another soft and quick voice echoed in Zhao Di's mind.

  "Unfortunately, they are all auxiliary in nature, and the actual attacking power is still discounted when encountering high-ranking cultivators. In terms of attack power alone, it's probably not even comparable to that top-grade spiritual artifact that our master used when we first met!" Youlan seemed to have a lot of experience and pointed out the characteristics of these two artifacts.

  "Yes, the master was only in the middle of building his foundation at that time, and he wasn't much different from us two sisters. He actually possessed such a powerful high-grade spiritual tool, it really scared me half to death!" The girl said with lingering fear, still vividly remembering Zhao Di's icy expression when he grasped the Blazing Heaven Blade, as if he could raise that crimson bone knife at any moment and slash her and her sister into nothingness, erasing them completely from existence.

  "So, Yōran guessed at a glance that the master must be from a wealthy family and was willing to take risks as a ghost slave. She placed all her hopes on the master!" Yōran also said with a smile.

  "Hmm, with Master's wealth and status, that elusive and ephemeral Yuan Ying realm is only a matter of time!" You Ruo also agreed.

  Zhao Zhi let out a bitter laugh and said, "You two don't need to flatter me anymore. I myself don't even know my own situation! If it wasn't for the Hunyuan Manual, even if I had the Qixin Dan and the three flames of Tianhuo liquid and the nine colds of Xuanyu water, these two excellent hot and cold attribute spiritual liquids, I still wouldn't have been able to successfully condense the dan. And yet, with this Hunyuan Manual, I was only barely able to condense the Hunyuan Golden Dan after cultivating it twice! As for the Yuanying, my Hunyuan Manual jade slip doesn't even have a cultivation method for breaking through to the Yuanying stage, let alone talking about breaking through to the Yuanying!"

  "Don't be discouraged, Master. Didn't you go to Ximen's cave this time just to enter the seal that can only be broken after forming the elixir? Maybe there's a way to impact the yuan infant and the cultivation method after the yuan infant period inside. At that time, Master's worries will be resolved!" Youlan comforted in a gentle voice.

  "That's right, who knows if there are any heaven-defying treasures inside that can greatly increase the master's power!" You Ruo also said.

  "I hope so!" Zhao muttered to himself.

  At the current speed of Zhao Di's escape, even if he had to stop and rest to recover his spiritual power halfway, after a total of only three months, he arrived again at the desolate small island where Xi Men San Ren's cave was located.

  On this road, he encountered several more demon beasts, but in general, he would not bother to reason with them and directly flew away. Only one fifth-level demon beast made an exception, letting him stay for a moment.

  He then easily killed the fifth-grade demon beast with the Emerald Green Sword and the Mind-Confusing Bell, taking away its demon core and demon soul.

  It turns out that the number of demons he encountered on this road is not small, and surprisingly, two of them are fifth-level demon beasts. Whether it's the level of the demon beasts or their density, it seems to be much higher than when he was here decades ago, slaughtering demons on a large scale. Is the rumored Beast Tide approaching again?

  Zhao floated in mid-air above the deserted island, carefully examining the island below him.

  "Is this where Xi Men's hideout is? You Lan doesn't feel anything out of the ordinary at all!" Zhao Di's mind echoed with the girl's voice once again.

  "Not bad, it's just a small island that's not too big, and there isn't even the aura of a low-level demon beast." You Ruo also said so.

  "Not bad, although this place is desolate and rarely visited, if it were easy to discover, I'm afraid the treasures of the cave would have been taken away by others long ago. How could it be my turn?" Zhao nodded and said. He carefully checked several places on the island that he had marked before, and indeed they were almost identical to what they were decades ago. It seemed that no one had come to this island in decades, which put his mind at ease.

  Zhao Di confirmed that the island was still the same as when he left, then landed beside several giant rocks, gently moved the rocks away, entered the secret cave beneath, and resealed the entrance with the rocks before slowly making his way down into the depths of the cave.

  "How did the master find this cave dwelling?" asked Youlan, puzzled. "Could it be that the master is a descendant or disciple of the Western Gate Wanderer?" This hidden cave was extremely well-concealed, and even if one were to search with their divine sense right next to it, they would still have difficulty finding it. She really couldn't imagine how a Foundation Establishment stage cultivator could possibly discover it.

  "Not bad, this hidden array method has never been heard of, and it's likely not from our Xingchen Sea Immortal Realm." You Ruo also said in a rare serious tone.

  The first update!